


This road’s not safe for driving

by dotfic



Category: Hawkeye (Comics)
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, with special appearances by Black Widow and the Hulk (sort of)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-18
Updated: 2016-01-18
Packaged: 2018-05-14 19:57:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5756287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dotfic/pseuds/dotfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kate rescues an injured Clint.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This road’s not safe for driving

**Author's Note:**

> For geckoholic. (Thank you for the encouragement. See? Look what you made me do! Look!) Thanks to 12arrows for the beta.

The large rabbit sat and stared at Clint, and by “large,” he meant it was around the size of a horse and by “rabbit” he meant it resembled a rabbit in shape, ears, and fluffy tail, but its fur was green. Also, it had bulging muscles.

“Oh, Clint,” it said, and funny thing, it spoke with Bruce’s voice, gentle, mournful tones, not the inarticulateness of the big green guy. 

It was cold on the cement floor of the abandoned power station, but at the moment it beat actually trying to get up. Once Clint figured out where the actual source of the pain was, he might start thinking about getting out of there.

“What?” Clint said, as the rabbit sighed and shook his head. “It’s not my fault. There were fifteen of them and one of me.”

“It happens to all of us, don’t worry about it,” the big green rabbit said. 

“I’m an Avenger for crying out—“

“Don’t do that to yourself, okay? Please?” One of the rabbit’s ears drooped.

His head. That was where most of the pain was. Also, he realized all of a sudden that he probably wasn’t awake, since behind the big green rabbit, the concrete turned into a meadow full of wildflowers and while it was shadowy where Clint lay, the meadow was full of sunlight. 

Definitely, he wasn’t awake. Out of the meadow came a fox with reddish highlights in her black coat. She moved with compact, fluid movements.

“Well, you are in a pickle, aren’t you?” the fox said. She tilted her head in a sympathetic yet somewhat exasperated way. “Sorry I wasn’t there to back you up. I could’ve taken ten while you dealt with the other one.”

“Hey, considering it was eleven against one I think I didn’t do too badly.”

“If you count your current state not doing too badly.” The fox moved closer and carefully nuzzled his forehead with her nose. “You’ll live, though.”

“I’m hard to kill.” He tried to sit up and winced.

“You definitely have a hard head,” the fox retorted. She lay down next to him, warm fur against his side. She curled her tail around her, neat and cat-like. “I’ll stick around for a few minutes. Help is on the way.”

He could’ve said something about how he was fine, she was only a hallucination anyway, and that he didn’t need a baby-sitter. 

Instead, Clint let himself fall back and closed his eyes. “Appreciate it.”

* * *

When he opened his eyes again, the meadow and the brightness were gone. The air smelled of rot and mildew. In the low light, he made out that there was graffiti on the walls, but not what any of it said. A rat scurried by.

Something other than just his head hurt. Clint put his fingers to his side and felt something wet and sticky on the outside of his uniform. Exploring further, he found the gash in his arm. His bow lay on the floor a few yards away. He didn’t see the quiver, but the arrows were easier to replace than the bow.

He fumbled in the pocket of his uniform for his phone, but paused at the creak of old iron hinges, the sound of a step. A shadow moved into view, the jut of a quiver and a bow at their shoulder.

“Oh, _shit_. Clint.” Kate hurried over to him, boots tapping hollow on the concrete. She pulled out a small flashlight.

“Kate!” He put his hand up. “It’s in my eyes!”

“Sorry.” The light lowered and Kate knelt next to him. “How long have you been here?”

“Dunno.” He managed to push himself up on his elbows. The room spun and he bit his tongue to keep from tossing his cookies. “Couple hours?” 

“What the hell happened?” Kate put the flashlight down, its beam picking up a line of debris and dirt and who knows what else across the floor. She began poking at him, fingers pushing lightly at his chest, tracing carefully—gently, even—over his head. “Okay, did you know you have a bad gash up here and also, wait…” Her fingers moved down. “There’s a knife-wound in your arm that’s, like, three inches long. Looks like both have mostly stopped bleeding but we need to get you to a hospital right awa—“

“No, no hospitals, Kate, it’s not necessary. Just need bandages and some water.”

She held up three fingers. “How many fingers am I holding up?”

“Eight.”

“Clint, I swear—“

“Three. Vision’s not blurry. But I might have a slight concussion. Also, it’s cold in here.”

“You’re lucky you didn’t go into shock.” She shifted her bow to sling farther back over her shoulder, then reached around him to pull him up.

The room spun again. He lurched, and Kate’s grip around him tightened.

“I’m fine,” he said, as she helped him through the large, dank room towards the exit. He kept his muscles tensed, trying not to lean more weight on her, yet he felt how hard he was leaning, and she didn’t falter at all. 

“Of course you are.” Kate kept moving quickly, her arm around his waist, his arm across her shoulders.

“My bow,” he said. 

Kate maneuvered him over so he could pick it up, then guided him in the direction of the door, where morning light streamed in through dirty panes. It seemed a long way off. He really had been there a long while; it had been the middle of the night when he got there. Kate grunted, then shifted her weight to turn the knob with her hip, and shove the door open with her knee. While he, on the other hand, was about as useful as a sack of potatoes.

The sunlight made him blink and sent a dump-truck of pain slamming through his head as they stumbled outside, down one step of cracked concrete where weeds and grass were growing up through the cracks.

He wanted to fall to his knees, to lie down and rest a few minutes. Just close his eyes, just a quick nap, something to make the pounding in his head better. He tried not to think about the sting of the injury on his arm.

“Okay, you’re not taking a nap here, dummy. My car’s just a few yards away.” Her arm went more tightly around him, her body warm where it touched his.

* * *

They argued all the way back to Bed-Stuy about whether he would go to a hospital or not. He won.

“Oh, stairs,” he gasped out, sagging against the wall. They were half-way up to his apartment. His head hurt, but at least the world wasn’t spinning any more.

Kate let go, slipping out from under his arm to face him. She reached up and gently touched the hurt spot on his head with her fingers, smoothing back his hair. “You’re a stubborn asshole.” She didn’t even sound pissed off at him.

“Wow, you only just figured that out?”

“Maybe I should’ve said the _degree_ that you’re a stubborn asshole surprises even me.” She curled her arm around his waist again, pulling him towards the next flight of stairs.

Finally, after only about 150 years or so, they reached his apartment. Lucky was at the door, barking up a storm, and kept whining and bumping against Clint’s legs all the way down the hall until Kate deposited Clint, not too gently, onto the rumpled blanket and sheets of his bed.

She sat down next to him. “We have to do something about that cut on your arm. It needs cleaning and stitches.”

“I can do it.”

Kate stared at him while Lucky nosed anxiously at Clint’s hand.

“Fine! You want to stitch me up, go ahead. First aid kit’s in the lower left-hand cabinet in the kitchen. I have actual medical supplies, Kate. I’m not completely stupid.”

She gave him another stare, then went to get the kit. Clint slowly and gingerly stripped out of his uniform and pulled on a t-shirt and sweatpants. 

Everything hurt too much so he left his uniform strewn on the floor and his bow propped against the chair, and curled up under the blanket.

* * *

“Ow.” It hurt more than Clint thought it would. 

“Whiner.”

Biting her lower lip in concentration, Kate added another stitch into his skin.

“How many more?” He turned his head, trying to see the wound more clearly. 

“Two, maybe? I just want to be sure it doesn’t re-open or something.”

Lucky had joined them on the bed and was lying at Clint’s feet, head up and alert, watching Clint.

“I’m fine,” Clint told him.

“Okay, I think that does it.” Kate put the needle and thread down on the tray she’d brought in to hold the medical supplies. “How’s your head?”

“Hurts a little but I’ll live.”

“You probably have a slight concussion.” Kate moved the tray over to the chair in the corner.

“Told you…wait, what are you doing?”

“I’m exhausted,” Kate said, unlacing her boots and tossing them in the corner. “I spent hours hunting you down, rescued you, then carried your sorry ass up many flights of stairs, then stitched up that ugly gash in your arm, listening to you complain the entire time. I want a nap.” She stretched out on the bed, facing him, her body curled towards his, dark hair against the pale blue pillowcase. “Also if you have any kind of concussion someone needs to keep checking on you.”

“Okay but I have to—“

“Get some rest, Clint.”

A nap did sound like a good idea.

* * *

He woke suddenly, for a startled second thinking he was still lying on that cold cement floor. Then the light through the windows registered, the warmth of the blanket, and the fact that Kate was asleep with her head on his chest, arm across his torso. Lucky must’ve decided Clint was, in fact, okay, and had wandered off to do dog things—he heard the sound of a squeaky toy in the other room.

The gash on his arm still stung a little, and when he moved carefully to look, small spots of blood stained the bandage, but it wasn’t too bad. His head hurt a lot less. In fact, except for a few aches in bruised places—nothing surprising there, after the clusterfuck he’d found himself in last night—he felt pretty good. A lot good. Far too good. Sleepy, contented, a little hungry. He wanted coffee but that could wait; why dislodge Kate, who seemed perfectly peaceful where she was, amazingly. 

This was a terrible idea.

Kate opened her eyes, blinked a few times, stirred. Now even more of her was aligned along Clint’s body.

What a really terrible idea.

She raised her head, brow furrowing a little, peering at him, assessing to see if he was any better. Her nose was an inch from his, and he’d never noticed the line of freckles under her left eye before, three small dots, or the tiny scar up near her hair-line.

It was Kate who moved first—he could swear, he didn’t move, she did, until their mouths were about an inch apart and then maybe they both moved. It was really hazy, but his lips brushed hers, or vice versa. It was light at first, and then they both pressed closer in, tongues touching. Kate was doing something with her fingers—trailing them lightly down his side—and it felt really really good. 

Crap. 

He drew back. “This is a really terrible idea.”

“Why?” She said, calm and holding his gaze steadily.

“Because I’ll ruin it. Screw it up somehow.”

Kate pushed herself up, away from him. Her hair tickled his arm, but only for a second before she moved too far away to touch. “Do I get an opinion? Or are you going to decide everything for both of us?”

He had no idea what to reply to that. His fingers curled into the creases of the sheets so he wouldn’t reach for her hand—and he really, really wanted to reach for her hand, or touch her face. 

Neither of them moved as the seconds dragged on, like they were stuck in some kind of weird elongated time bubble. 

“I’m hungry,” Kate said, her tone relentlessly practical now as she got off the bed. “I’m going out to get muffins.”

“Ok.” 

“And coffee,” she added.

“Coffee would be good,” he agreed carefully. Clint sat up, rearranging a pillow behind his head.

Kate nodded. She paused to lean against the door frame, arms folded. “When I spotted you, at first I was scared you were dead.” She bit her lip and stared hard down at the scratched wood flooring.

Her voice made his chest ache. “Thank you,” he said. “Thanks for coming to get me, Katie.”

“Asshole,” she said, looking at him now, her eyes a little damp.

“Uh-huh.”

She left the room. He heard the jangle of Lucky’s leash and his paws excitedly scrabbling against the floor at the prospect of a walk, and then Kate yelled out “You’re welcome!” before the door closed after them.

**Author's Note:**

> *title by The Airborne Toxic Event


End file.
